Vidauban

So, Vidauban is in sight! It seems to be a never ending job trying to get everything organised and with us leaving the week after next time seems to be disappearing all too quickly. We are taking 7 horses, the big tour and small tour horses that went to Addington at the end of Jan, plus Woodlander Wavavoom and Woodlander Farouche. It will be quite an experience for Wavavoom and Farouche, incl all the travel etc, and for me who will have to drive one of the lorries (we are having to take two!) I am very content with being co driver and taking frequent naps but unfortunately will not be able to on this trip!

The big show at Addington at the end of Jan was great for preparation, it really helped us to see where the horses are at in their training so we have been working on fine tuning since then, we also have had the small tour freestyle to music to think about as Woodlander Rockstar and Woodlander Dornroeschen have not as yet done one. We have music from before which has been used for the likes of Two Sox, Marakov etc but each horse has different strengths and also takes a different amount of time to cover the ground so we have been having to think out different floor plans for them. I have the timings for the music so it is just a case of creating a suitable floor plan and timing each section so it matches with the timings of the music.


I took Worldwide for his Winter Regionals at Addington last weekend. He competed in the Medium Open and coped with things well. I had anticipated that the competition would be held outdoors, so had been riding him outside. It was in actual fact held inside so spooky judges tables and flower pots/banners were at the ready which was all quite a new experience for him as he hasn't done that much. The trot work was perhaps a little tentative and he got a little bit hot in the canter but I was pleased that he stayed focused and listened to me. He finished 9th with 67% so will have to wait and see if he gets through on a wild card . . .I feel that he still needs to gain confidence in the ring so it is all work in progress! I am taking him to Hartpury this weekend to complete his Summer Qualification at Medium level. We have decided to take a few of the others as well, not to compete but to give them an outing. We have Half Moon Delphi who is owned by Julie Deverill and Woodlander Rockstar's baby, Woodlander Rochelle so it could be an eventful day!

I am also having to get my head around Young Horse Qualifiers for when we return from Vidauban as Wavavoom will have to go back to stud Apr-Jul which I am sure he is looking forward to! There are so many different Young Horse Classes!


The horses are definitely feeling that Spring is in the air with the temperatures gradually rising, and I say gradually, so as not to speak too soon! I was riding in a t-shirt yesterday   :-)!! The Stallions are feeling very well so we are having to take a few extra precautions with handling etc. Speaking of which, I am delighted that Don Perry has now retired to stud. He was such a great little horse and gave me so much, he so deserves to have a happy retirement and I am sure he will thoroughly enjoy his work. Many thanks to those who helped to make it happen.

Competition Time!

So, we have had the first wave of competition go by already, we took 6 horses down to Addington for the premier show and all went really well, very pleased with them and it was a good indication to see where they're at after this Winter's training.



Worldwide was 1st and 2nd in his Medium tests-I was especially pleased because his tests were outside and it was rather fresh and cold! In the week leading up to Addington I had made myself venture outside with him so he got used to the chilly weather beforehand and needless to say I had some rather eventful rides! He coped with the pressure of the test so much better with having had his training become so much more established at Medium level over the winter, last year while he was still being trained towards Medium level he would easily get tense and nervous in the ring.


Woodlander Rockstar and Woodlander Dornroeschen competed at PSG/INT I. Rockstar felt so much more established at PSG, it was my first INT 1 on him- very pleased with all his lateral work, just need to work on getting him to contain his power a bit more still, he is always so keen to take impulsion forwards! Dornroeschen was looking great, she just had a few costly mistakes in the canter work.

We had Marakov, Two Sox and Monet in the Grand Prix-it was a very big class! Marakov was a little spooky but with it being the first show of the season it was understandable. Very pleased with Two Sox, a very clean and accurate test and feeling well for 17- he got one of his best scores to date, over 71%! He was so fresh the day before, squealing and bucking like a just backed 3 year old but he seemed to know when it was time to compete and settled well. Monet was very calm which is what we were aiming for with him has he has been inclined to get rather over excited in the past, not being able to show any halt immobility or walk which is very expensive even if he does the rest of the work really well. He did halt and did walk with only a small mistake at the end of the extended canter.


On Saturday we took Woodlander Santana, a 3 year old stallion owned by Alison and John Walton, Woodlander Wavavoom and Woodlander Rockstar to the Stallion Show at Hartpury where they had to show themselves in hand and give a short music display under saddle-a very eventful evening! Having the 3 Stallions on the lorry and having to unload them and show them in hand first thing when they had only just arrived was a little bit hairy to say the least, there wasn't too much room on the car park to keep them away from each other and definitely a lot of male testosterone in the air! Mike rode Santana who coped very well with still being relatively new to being ridden under saddle and Wavavoom felt great, slightly out of control at times but his range of movement felt amazing. Rockstar was the ultimate professional, at the end of his display he had Woodlander Rhythm and Blues (his son) come in which made him grow another couple of hands, proud Dad!

The next thing on the calendar will be the Winter Regionals with Worldwide and then we are hoping to go to the 2 week show that is being held in Vidauban, France mid-end March. It is quite similar to the Sunshine Tour in Spain re the range of classes that they have available (Young Horse to Grand Prix) but hopefully will not be quite so far to travel...
 
Maria x

Maria turns 27!

So, I am now 27 years old, I had my birthday last week! For Christmas I decided to buy theatre tickets for my family as their Christmas present to ensure we did something.


We went to watch the Lion King which was lovely, the costumes were amazing and the way the stage kept changing was unreal. It was a lovely day so we had a little look around London afterwards, taking in the atmosphere. My parents had gone down the night before for the Breeders dinner where Lynne (who had bred a lot of our horses) was awarded the prize for Farouche, we travelled up on the day so we could sort the horses out first thing.

I have entered Addington at the end of the month, we have 6 horses going so will be busy and following on we have a Stallion Show at Hartpury. The horses have been going well, I reclipped Ed (Two Sox) yesterday as he was fast becoming a wooly bear again and had the double on him today, he gave me rather an enquiring look as I got on him as if to say, "I take it that's the end of the holiday then!" A bit of test practice is due before we compete I think, we will probably run through the tests in the next few days just to get our bearings, it's amazing how quickly you get out of practice!

Maria x

Olympia and SPOTY

So, we did get  a White Christmas after all, we must have a good 12 inches now!

My day down at Olympia was fun, I was invited to join the British Equestrian Writers Association for lunch which was lovely, and received a lovely photo of our team at WEG which was a really nice surprise and will always be treasured. I had the Parade at Olympia in the evening so had time for a look around the shopping village in between, luckily I had a time limit with the Parade still to come so couldn't let my shopping get out of control! For the Parade we were mounted and I rode Tina Fletchers showjumping horse, I haven't been in a proper jumping saddle in ages!


With a few days in between I had the Sports Personality afterwards which is also always an occasion. With my ticket in hand I had a good seat, third row from the front so a good view. I was surprised at how packed the stadium was, the weather had been really bad and with it being at the NEC I was lucky with only having a few miles to travel. I had an interesting entrance onto the dual carriageway from my lane but luckily with not much traffic I could afford to wheel spin for a few seconds, on the way home as I was just thinking I had made it when I came to the final T junction and again quite a mega wheel spin but this time I had the rear end of the car overtake the front end, interesting and definitely got the adrenalin going!


We are now winding down for Christmas, we will work the horses again tomorrow and then our staff officially leave us for the holiday. The whole family will be on hand to deal with the horses! By the New Year everything should be back to normal and ready for the 2011 season to start, wishing everyone a Great Christmas and New Year :-) x x

Christmas Decoration Fun

It has been a tough couple of weeks with the cold weather but thank goodness it has got a bit milder in the last couple of days. I mustn't really complain as we are very lucky and have an indoor. Speaking of which, we've had some entertainment with the Christmas decorations in the school! Dad put them up last week. The reactions of the horses was very different. Some didn't want to go anywhere near them whereas others made a bee line for them thinking they were edible!

We've been cracking on with training (despite a burst pipe in the water mains - not fun). The older horses definitely feel the weather a lot more and need plenty of time to limber up. The younger ones come out all guns blazing!

Woodlander Rockstar and Woodlander Dornroschen are really coming on and enjoying learning new things. We have been continuing with the piaffe and passage, it takes quite a bit of time for them to build strength for it so it's just a case of incorporating it a bit into each training session to build them up.

Woodlander Wavavoom and Woodlander Farouche are also learning new things, they are going to be aimed for the 5 year old classes next year so are gradually being introduced to some lateral work.

I have Olympia and Sports Personality next week which I am looking forward to. We have the team parade at Olympia and I have made sure I have my ticket for Sports Personality this time. Last year I forgot to confirm my place so I had to try and blag a spare seat. Luckily one came up on the front row which was pretty cool and quite surreal!

Your Horse Live

So, back riding again and all seems OK fingers crossed. The horses have been nice and gentle with me on the whole except for the other day when it was a nice crisp morning albeit with some fog, and I thought how nice it would be to ride outside. Needless to say the horses were very fresh and desperately wanted to have some fun so I had to sit tight!

Your Horse Live was an adventure and a good experience both for horse and rider! We had a slight change of horse material, taking Woodlander Wavavoom instead of Woodlander Rochelle as she came into season the day before andf didn't seem that comfortable.

All horses behaved very well. Woodlander Wavavoom was extremely confident in his surroundings, more so than Monet who was a little on his toes - Mike couldn't stop once he had come into the arena so we had to limit his time frame as not to exhaust him.

Woodlander Rockstar was a true gent unlike the others who only did one demo each day, he did a bit on both demos each day so by the last one he was a little unenthused.

Riding with the mics was one of my worst fears as I concentrate so much when I ride that I find it difficult to talk, not to mention that I can sounds horribly out of breath! Mike was a natural at this and I think we managed to demonstrate fairly well. It is so difficult to try and cover everything in a couple of days and also catering for people who might just be there for the one day/morning/afternoon. There were a few moments when we cam close to talking over each other but on the whole I think we managed to complement each other quite well...

Dad is now back from the Asian games, it feels like he has been away so much of late. As soon as we got back from Kentucky he was off to quarantine and then straight on to China. He is off to Ireland next week!

We seem to have quite a full yard at the moment with quite a few young ones in for training. As we are not doing so much comepting now until the new year we are concentrating on the training and bringing the horses on for next year, the plan is that they will all move up a level! I am also finally getting on top of my clear out which is good news!

Maria x

WEG Kentucky 2010

I have just returned home from WEG and am currently recovering from a little op. I had to put off until after the big event!



WEG was excellent, it took a bit of doing to get everything ready and to get out there and back but the silver medal made it all worthwhile! Just after having been at the Nationals with 9 horses I had 2 days to get the lorry unpacked, the gear cleaned and re-pack for WEG. I travelled with Ed (Two Sox) to Liege where the horses were due to fly from, we stopped 1 night at Nadine Cappellmans so the horses had a chance to have a leg stretch and rest before the flight. There were 80 horses who were flying from Liege so as you can imagine the airport was rather busy- we had to be super organized and have everything ready separately for what was going to be needed for the flight, quarantine and the venue itself. Once we had seen them off I came back home to England to do a quick pack of my things before having to depart from Heathrow the next morning. Although I couldn’t travel with Ed we had Jenny Hall, our vet, and Carole Levitt, Laura Bechtolsheimer’s groom, travel with them and then John McEwen, our team vet, was to join them in quarantine so they were to be well looked after!


It was a long journey for us, we caught the plane from Heathrow at 8am and at Chicago we had to do a transfer to Lexington-there was also a 5 hour time difference! Outside of the airport there was so much space and acres of grassland all fenced in white post and rail, takeaway venues everywhere! We arrived mid afternoon so enough time to get to the stables and meet our neddies for a quick leg stretch. Unfortunately Ed wasn’t looking his usual self when I arrived at the stables he had had a slight temperature in quarantine. I just walked him for a few days until his temperature and bloods were back to normal, and with having arrived with a week before the competition was due to start I had just enough time to get him into gear. With having to take it easy for the first few days I had plenty of time to explore the showground which was massive. It was a 15 minute walk to get to the stables from the shuttle stop, another 15 minutes to get to the catering from the stables, 20 minutes to get from the stables to the main arena and 40 minutes to get from the main arena to the grooms accommodation. We also had a group visit to the Keenlands racing stables and venue followed by a quick tour around Sheik Mohammed’s stables before the competition got under way which was a new experience. At the time they were having their annual sales, selling hundreds of youngsters a day!


It was quite tricky to work Ed enough that he was submissive and well behaved but not to exhaust him and put his body under strain with having been travel sick. John did a great job with monitoring him and Vicky Spalding the team physio worked on him as well so that I didn’t have to do that much and that when I rode him I took lots of breaks. He did a very good consistent Grand Prix, I was really pleased. The rest of the team did really good tests as well and with Laura s mega score we ended up in Silver position not far away from the Dutch! We had got bronze in our sights but thought that the Germans were looking fairly strong again this year. Of course we had to celebrate but not too much as we had all qualified for the Special and with it being drawn in reverse order of results from the Grand Prix I was due to go fairly early, actually it was nice as the weather was turning hot again (it had been a sweltering 98F when we arrived, which suddenly plummeted to 56F for a few days and raining before turning hot again but this time pleasantly in the seventies. With the team result having been decided we could all up the risk factor a little bit more. Ed was great once again with no mistakes and I thought that he was altogether looser and fresher-the following day when I thought he would have been tired he was the freshest he had been all week, not tired one little bit which was great seeing as he had not been up to full strength when he arrived. It also was good from the point of view that the return journey was coming up and I wanted him to be fighting fit before having to have to travel home. The last few combinations in the Special and Freestyle were amazing, so much so that you felt that there should have been 5 medals made available.


Before returning back to the UK I did a quick dash around the trade stands to get myself a cowboy hat and a bling belt, a must if you go to the States! The journey home was overnight and I am still trying to recover from the jet lag, I didn’t think I would get it on the way home but it has hit me good and proper! Ed travelled home really well-the horses had quite a long trek back again but had plenty of stops to break the journey up and have opportunity to eat, drink and rest. I think he is tired but no travel sickness which was a relief and he is happy and well having a well deserved break. A short break for me as I am unable to ride for a moment but loads to do on the admin side- and some planning necessary as to what happens next!

Maria x